Despite his coy looks and insightful glances, he did leave me alone for the rest of the meal. I was left to enjoy Chef’s imaginative and delicious concoctions without tasting a single thing.
All I could think about was Father Garius and the other monks at the Temple of Eternal Life. Had I unwittingly put them in danger? Would someone hunt them down because of me?
I took a deep pull from my wine and decided to right my error first thing in the morning. Oliver was questioning his future and feeling lost. Well, I had the perfect task for him. He would hopefully find the answers he was looking for. And I would find the ones I was suddenly looking for as well.
Thanks to Caspian and his plotting and scheming. He might have nefarious reasons for me to check on the Temple, but only time would tell.
ChapterFive
The week of festivities and celebration that followed the first banquet quickly became exhausting. Used to muslin day dresses and fur-lined slippers, my body ached from too-tight corsets and heeled shoes that always seemed to end in a point and squish my poor toes to death.
All the royal men of the realm were given an opportunity to show off their skills in an archery contest. The town of Sarasonet was even invited to spectate. At first, I was excited to watch Taelon compete. I had never seen him with an arrow, but he was the kind of male who would naturally excel at anything. Only he did not enter.
Nor did Caspian, although I had been equally thrilled with the opportunity for him to fail.
Instead, it was mostly ministers and valets and a fourth son from Tenovia who took the champion’s wreath on the basis that everyone else stopped trying once he stepped up to shoot. I had sat in the spring heat, bored and underwhelmed. Katrinka had actually fallen asleep next to me, and I probably should have roused her, but it had saved me from trying to make awkward small talk while old men struggled against bowstrings and failing eyesight.
The following day, the men went for a hunt in the mountains. Queen Ravanna hosted a tea for the ladies, but far from being entertaining, we were forced to sit through a musical concert based on the fifth-century Ulala tribes from across the Crystal Sea.
Katrinka was not as kind to me when I started to doze off.
The banquets lasted well past midnight every night. Feats of strength. More contests. Concerts. Teas. I woke every morning well before sunrise to primp and posture. And went to bed well into the morning hours after much drinking of wine and cider and headaches from the boisterous laughter. And more small talk than anyone should ever be subjected to.
At each event, Katrinka and I were thrust together. Whether by nefarious plan or natural instinct, my uncle orchestrated ample opportunities for us to get reacquainted. Only, that would require real conversation and authenticity—of which my sister seemed to possess neither. Maybe deep down, beneath the layer of frost as thick and impenetrable as the Ice Mountains themselves, was a genuine person who cared about our family and me. Or even our realm. But she was either unwilling or incapable of treating me with anything but cold indifference thus far. So our forced interactions were wearing on me more than the festivities.
Not once was kingdom policy discussed or debated. Kings never gathered to talk about the threat of the Ring of Shadows or even the Rebel Army. Poverty was rampant across the realm, and these monarchs reveled in rich foods and constant drinking. Whole villages in Tenovia burned while I had journeyed across the width of it, but you would not know it from the way its monarchs behaved. The same could be said of Elysia. I hadn’t seen the rest of the realm for myself, but I had no doubt the tale could be told from any kingdom.
What had started off as an exciting prospect to get to know and understand the other royals I would be working with in the future had devolved into something deeply depressing. And by the fifth day, I could no longer hide my disgust.
We were at lunch in the gardens. The spring blooms were at their peak. And sheer, billowing tents that came to sharp points at each corner and in the middle had been set up to offer shade.
The gardens were my favorite part of Castle Extensia. Unlike the hall, which seemed to always be dark no matter the time of daylight and reminded me of ghosts and too many hard memories, the gardens were exquisitely untouched by my past. My uncle had renovated them after he took the throne.
He’d brought in flowering desert bushes from Kasha and Vorestra. Orange and lemon trees from the coast of western Soravale. Towering thin-limbed shrubs from the edges of the Tenovian forest. Each section of the sprawling gardens represented a different kingdom. The gardeners were trained specifically to make the glory of each kingdom shine. Which wasn’t easy given the castle’s mountain domain.
But when walking down the path with budding Aramore rose trees, each bloom a vibrant pink or orange or red, it was impossible not to feel transported to a wealthy kingdom with more gold than they knew what to do with. The scents from the fruit trees from Soravale were enough to make one’s mouth water. And the white-barked paths of Blackthorne with its bone-colored oaks that bloomed with equally snow-white buds that turned into translucent leaves made one feel as unsettled and paranoid as I was sure their queen intended.
Clesta walked me to the table reserved for me, Katrinka, and a smattering of other delegates and royalty from around the realm. The sun was unseasonably hot this afternoon, but a delicious breeze made the heat bearable.
Thankfully, the dress designer had accounted for the weather, so my gown was made of thinner, lighter material, even if there were as many ruffles and folds as usual. I had to resist the urge to start ripping layers off, but, seeing my valiant battle not to start sweating, Clesta quickly grabbed a nearby wicker fan and waved it my way.
We were the first ones to sit down besides Katrinka. Even our uncle had yet to arrive. I relaxed into my low-backed lawn chair and smiled at her. “This weather reminds me of Heprin. It always seemed unseasonably warm there. Unless of course we were in the dregs of winter. Then it was always unseasonably too cold.”
She tipped her face toward a slice of sunlight that had reached her chair. It was then that I noticed she’d inched away from the table in order to be more completely doused with it. “It is always cold in Barstus,” she said, sounding annoyed with her adopted country for the first time since we’d been reunited. “Cold and wet. We have no snow. Not like I remember in these mountains. But it never stops raining. I feel as though I have not seen the sun shine since I was a child.”
I let the smile sound in my voice when I teased, “Youaredreadfully pale for an Allisand.”
Her sharp eyes found mine, and I could tell she was ready to strike. I grinned wider, showing her I wasn’t serious. She looked away, biting back whatever retort sat on her tongue.
Not for the first time, I wondered about her upbringing. Did they not have fun in Barstus? Was there no joking or play? Did they simply read tomes all day and practice their intellectual serenity?
I yawned on instinct. I would have been driven mad there. The silent temple had been hard enough for me to endure, and I was given free rein to wander the grounds, explore the nearby village, and laugh as often as I liked with Oliver. How the monks must have hated our devilries. But oh, how my wild spirit needed them.
“What else was Barstus like?” I asked after a long stretch of silence. Katrinka had been reluctant to talk to me about herself. I’d asked countless questions about the palace, her education, her adopted siblings, and what she’d been up to for the past nine years. But she had always avoided answering with anything of substance. I’d been left to sort through clues that provided no real answer. My concern for her only grew.
But maybe she would be willing to talk about the country itself. The weather. The terrain. Dragon’s blood, I would even talk about religious holiday traditions if it got her to say more than two sentences to me.
“I just told you,” she said with that same knife-edge glare. “Wet. The kind of wet that sinks into your bones and makes you live with a constant shiver. My maids would put hot stones in my blankets before bed so I didn’t freeze to death through the night. I remember winters here, but I also remember hot summers. The rain in Barstus is relentless.”
